In 17th-century Italy, it was not uncommon for well-to-do families to own slaves, most of whom came from North Africa. Likewise, North Africa was home to a robust trade in Christian slaves. Tamar Herzig tells the story of the horrific abuse of a group of Jewish slaves in Livorno, which was at the time home to one of Europe’s freest and most prosperous Jewish communities:

Late in the summer of 1610, a group of enslaved female Jews from the northern Moroccan city of Tétouan were raped by Muslim slaves and Catholic forced laborers in the Tuscan port city of Livorno, early modern Italy’s leading slaving center. The multiple-perpetrator rape took place in Livorno’s slave prison and was orchestrated by Dr. Bernardetto Buonromei, . . . a high-ranking official of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany.

Buonromei, Herzig explains, deliberately exposed the women to male prisoners to encourage their rape, almost certainly as a way to extort money from the local Jewish community:

The Knights of St. Stephen, [who had captured the vessel bearing these Jewish women and enslaved them and their fellow passengers] could enslave any non-Catholic during their excursions. Once in Livorno, enslaved Orthodox Christians, Armenians, Protestants, and Jews were not allotted fixed places to worship at the Bagno, [the place where slaves were kept], whereas Muslim slaves were provided with mosques. This difference reflected the Medici’s awareness that abusing the religious rights of Muslims was bound to become known to Maghrebi authorities, resulting in retaliations against Catholic captives. Whereas diplomatic considerations involved in dealing with the home countries of Muslim slaves provided them with some protection against inhumane treatment, such deterrents did not affect the fate of Jewish slaves. . . . [I]n the 17th century, there was no sovereign Jewish power that enslaved Jews could count on for exerting political pressure on their oppressors—nor could Jewish slaves hope to gain their liberty through an exchange with Christian captives.

By 1606, the plight of enslaved Jews had moved the leaders of Livorno’s Jewish nation to establish the Ḥevrat Pidyon Sh’vuyim, a fund for assisting captives for whom no ransom was forthcoming. Between 1607 and 1611, more than 70 additional Jewish slaves were brought to Livorno from the eastern Mediterranean and North Africa. Their growing numbers led the massari, [the leaders of the Jewish community], to approve a self-imposed tax on goods traded by Jewish merchants in Livorno, to be used for redeeming enslaved Jews. Ferdinando de’ Medici approved the tax; . . . the presence of a thriving community, whose leaders could be pressured into providing ransom for enslaved Jews, influenced these slaves’ treatment. Thus, according to Jewish rabbis, Bagno officials were especially cruel to enslaved Jews on the Sabbath, forcing them to carry out harsh construction work on their holy day, in violation of Jewish law, so that Livorno’s Jews would hear their cries and raise the sum for their release.

Herzig goes on to demonstrate that the rape was simply another form of such deliberate cruelty. (The link below requires a subscription, but a longer summary can be found here.)

Surveying news websites and social media on Sunday morning, I immediately found some intelligent and well-informed observers arguing that Iran deliberately warned the U.S. of its pending assault on Israel, and calibrated it so that there would be few casualties and minimal destructiveness, thus hoping to avoid major retaliation. In other words, this massive barrage was a face-saving gesture by the ayatollahs. Others disagreed. Brian Carter and Frederick W. Kagan put the issue to rest:

The Iranian April 13 missile-drone attack on Israel was very likely intended to cause significant damage below the threshold that would trigger a massive Israeli response. The attack was designed to succeed, not to fail. The strike package was modeled on those the Russians have used repeatedly against Ukraine to great effect. The attack caused more limited damage than intended likely because the Iranians underestimated the tremendous advantages Israel has in defending against such strikes compared with Ukraine.

But that isn’t to say that Tehran achieved nothing:

The lessons that Iran will draw from this attack will allow it to build more successful strike packages in the future. The attack probably helped Iran identify the relative strengths and weaknesses of the Israeli air-defense system. Iran will likely also share the lessons it learned in this attack with Russia.

Iran’s ability to penetrate Israeli air defenses with even a small number of large ballistic missiles presents serious security concerns for Israel. The only Iranian missiles that got through hit an Israeli military base, limiting the damage, but a future strike in which several ballistic missiles penetrate Israeli air defenses and hit Tel Aviv or Haifa could cause significant civilian casualties and damage to civilian infrastructure, including ports and energy. . . . Israel and its partners should not emerge from this successful defense with any sense of complacency.